A TEMPERANCE MOVEMENT

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXVI, Issue 5288, 28 May 1904, Page 10

A TEMPERANCE MOVEMENT

Central Public House Trust Association. Third Annual Kepart. The Lombard Prci-i, AS, Gracctliurch street. London-. The (bird annual report of the esccu. live committee of the Central Public iiou.-o Trust Association, of which Lord Grey is president, has just been issued from tiie oli.ccs of the association, 110> Victoria street, S. i\. Tiie association was formed in 1901 v.’itli two (dejects: (1) To convert, wherever possible, the pnMichoiiso from’ a drinking-bar into a house of refreshment for the supply of wholesome food and non-alcoholic Honors, as well ns of beer and spirits; and (2; to provide such an organisation as will .enable tho licensing authorities to secure that all new licenses, with their high monopoly values, shall bo administered as a trust in tlio interests of the Xiuhhc, and not by private individuals for their personal gain." The report forms a pamphlet of nearly oqo pages, with full information about each of till* -ill existing trust companies. Progress during 1 HOT is declared to have been steady and satisfactory. Twentynine trust companies arc now working in Kb gland, one in Wales, eleven in Scotland, and one in Ireland. Those com. panics, with a total subscribed capital of over, £300,000, have bronght'imder trust management 130 jiuhlichouscs—a number which is increasing every week. The only English comities without a trust company formed, or being formed, are Berkshire Buckinghamshire, Leicestershire, and Oxfordshire. In Ontario, Manitoba, • South Australia, Hew Zealand, Tasmania, Mauritius, Natal, and the Transvaal, active agencies are bringing trust principles before the public. In Gormanv, where it is noted that the movement has attracted the attention of the Knipcror, and in the United States of America sister societies arc also at work. _ 1 It is. claimed in tiie report that ox-, periencc so far has not justified tho lear that trust management might lend to increase the national consumption of drink. Tho People’s .Refreshment House Association can show that in thirteen houses which have been under the management since 1900 there is n considerable decrease in the sale cf intoxicants. The rears 1901 and 1903 showed about £500" lower than 1900; last year there was another large fall. The non-alco-holic trade of a trust public house in Staffordshire wag at first only a few lienee a day, now it oftpii reaches £3 a day. At another house “working men drop in constantly for a pint of tea or cofieo instead of beer.’ - ' At the Delaval Arms, Elswick, during a surprise visit of some abstainers, it was found that, out of thirty men who were dining, only o'ne had a glass of beer by vno side of bis plate. Since tho trust took over tho management of a publichouso in the Midlands, other-publiehouses within a radius pi, say, ten miles, display signs to tiie effect that teas, etc., are provided. The chairman of the Ulster Trust Company writes that so great a change has come over local opinion that a brewer's draymaii can drink his cup of coffee on the doorstop of a crust house whilst watching his cart without incurring chaff or disrespect, whereas “eighteen months ago this would only have been ventured in the ser elusion of tho inner room after the curtains had been drawn, tp hide the act from gossips’ eyes.” Out of tho surplus profits for 1903 of a publichouso at Cowdenbeath, Life, which is under tho management of a committee of miners, a sum of over £IOOO has been distributed to objects of public benefit in the neighbourhood. Tho report condemns tho practice adopted by licensing courts of requiring the applicant for a new license in a district where a public house is admittedly needed to surrender three or four licenses in a district where' they are too numerous- This policy, it is said, leads to all new licenses coming exclusively into the hands of brewers, and being run as “tied” bouses.

Among the appendices is a memorandum hy Lieutenant-Colonol Craufurd on points'of detail in the arrangement and management .of trust houses, written after a visit paid by him to some of the principal trust houses in England and Scotland. He states that all the companies are zealously and loyally shaping their course in accordance with the great principles of constructive reform on which the movement is based.